1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus using an electro-photographic technology such as a printer, a copier, a facsimile, and a multi-function printer, and more specifically to an image forming apparatus including a cover member opening or shielding a storage portion drawably storing a toner recovery container.
2. Description of the Related Art
An image forming apparatus is provided with a toner recovery container recovering and reserving transfer residual toner scraped from an image carrier such as a photosensitive drum and an intermediate transfer belt by cleaning blades and deteriorated toner forcibly discharged out of a developing unit. The toner recovery container is provided drawably into/out of a body of the apparatus (referred to as an ‘apparatus body’ hereinafter) so that a user can pull the toner recovery container out of the apparatus body and replace with a new one.
For instance, Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. Hei. 7-261617 discloses an image forming apparatus including an apparatus body provided with a storage portion storing the toner recovery container and the storage portion configured to be opened/closed (opened/shielded) by a cover member to prevent the recovered toner from scattering and a sensor detecting a quantity of the recovered toner from erroneously operating.
By the way, if a user keeps forgetting to close the storage portion after storing the toner recovery container into the storage portion, the storage portion is kept opened, possibly scattering the toner and causing erroneous operations of the toner quantity detecting sensor described above. In the apparatus described above, a part of a sheet cassette provided drawably into/out of the apparatus body functions also as a cover of the toner recovery container. Therefore, if the user inserts the sheet cassette while erroneously forgetting to close the storage portion, it becomes difficult for the user to close the storage portion by the cover member afterward because the part of the sheet cassette functioning also as the cover becomes obstructive. In such a case, the user has to pull out the inserted sheet cassette once just to close the storage portion by the cover member and to insert the sheet cassette again after closing the storage portion by the cover member. However, such works are time-consuming and troublesome.